A man who ploughed his van into a crowd of Muslims near a mosque in north London has been found guilty of murder.
Makram Ali, 51, was killed and nine other worshipers injured when the van mounted the pavement in Finsbury Park in June last year.
Jurors took less than an hour to return their verdict on 48-year-old Darren Osborne after an eight-day trial that at times bordered on the absurd.
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The court heard how Osborne had been fuelled by hatred of Muslims and had initially planned to kill “as many people as possible” at an Islamic march in London that has in the past been attended by Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, whom he labelled a “terrorist sympathiser”.
He also said “if [London Mayor] Sadiq Khan had been there it would have been even better, like winning the lottery”.
But in a bizarre exchange reported by The Guardian, Osborne told the jury he had not in fact carried out the attack, and a man named Dave jumped into his van, driving into the crowd without his prior knowledge before “vanishing like a magician”.
Prosecutors dismissed this as pure fantasy, and presented that he had asked directions to the nearest mosque. They showed CCTV footage of Osborne doing laps around the area before driving straight into a crowd of people in Islamic dress.
Witnesses also reported hearing him shout afterwards: “I’ve done my job, you can kill me now” and “I want to kill more Muslims”. He was seen smiling and blowing a kiss as he was taken away by police.
The jury were also shown a handwritten note found in the van in which Osborne complained about terrorists on UK streets and the Rotherham child grooming scandal, which the court heard he had become obsessed with after watching a BBC drama.
The note also referred to Muslims as “feral” and described Muslim men as “rapists”.
Sky News says mobile phones and tablets seized by police from Osborne’s home showed internet searches for far-right groups, including Britain First and the English Defence League.
Osborne is due to be sentenced later today.
